If the mic on your phone, laptop or other device leaves a bit to be desired, the bootlegMIC is a simple DIY mic that sounds fantastic and takes up almost no space at all.
If you love to homebrew but live in an area where temperatures get too hot for proper fermentation you can resolve yourself to wait to brew or you can build a badarse Arduino Nano-controlled UberFridge which will maintain temperatures set to a tenth of a degree and can be monitored or controlled using a custom webapp. If you have a spare working fridge the build will cost around $US100 in parts.
To save money or avoid a trip to the store you can make your own reusable dryer sheets by dipping white wash cloths or rags into a little liquid fabric softener until they’re completely saturated and allow them to dry completely — you’ll be able to use each rag around a dozen times until you need to repeat the process.
We’ve covered many mouse traps over the years, but they all need to be reset once you’ve caught a mouse. This means if you have lots of furry intruders you’ll need to have several traps or just build this version using a bucket, a soft drink can, a small piece of wood and a wooden dowel.
Ever found a beautiful bird dead outside your home? Chances are it smashed into your window and never recovered. For every dead bird you find, just imagine how many were snatched up by a cat or pulled into the brush by some other critter. Worldwide, window collisions kill close to a billion(!) birds every year. Now is as good as ever to make your home bird safe. The DIY experts at Stack Exchange tell you how.
Everyone loves the iPhone’s headset with volume and music controls on the inline remote, but if you have an Android phone, you can actually get iPhone-designed buds working with your device. All it takes is a little DIY magic.
A good fleece vest can keep you warm on a chilly day, but thanks to Instructables user libraryCat, it can also be the ultimate storage device, complete with internal pockets to hold all of your gear. All you need is a fleece vest that fits, and a shirt you don’t mind cutting up — both of which he found at his local thrift store.
Ever felt like Google Maps doesn’t provide enough detail of the aerial view of your neighbourhood? Ever wanted to make your own maps or participate in a little homegrown science? Balloon mapping is a cheap way to take aerial pictures for all sorts of purposes — even events like weddings, graduations or parties — and it’s dead simple to do it yourself. Here’s how it works.
Left your tripod at home? Add some tripod-like stabilisation to your camera with just a pen and some string. The “stringpod” will help you take sharp photos by reducing your hands’ shakiness.
Wooden utensils aren’t too difficult to care for, but over time even the best wooden spoons, bowls, cutting boards and furniture start to show their age. Thankfully, you can bring them back to life with this recipe for “wood butter”, which is essentially a canned mix of beeswax and mineral oil. Keep it in a jar or form it into bars and apply to any wooden utensil you own that needs a little restoration.
